Plastic trash is becoming a big problem on land and sea and a company has found a new use for the plastic waste it’s been scooping up in the canals of Amsterdam — office furniture.
The company, Plastic Whale, boasts as being the world’s first plastic fishing company. More than 11,000 people have volunteered to help clean up Amsterdam’s canals since the company began its cleanup effort in 2011. In that time, over 100,000 plastic bottles and 2,000 bags of plastic waste has been removed.
Now Plastic Whale has teamed up with furniture maker Vepa and the Lama design studio to turn all that trash into high-end office furniture. The current lineup consists of a boardroom table, a chair, lamps and acoustic wall panels.
The table top is made from a sandwich of recycled PET, FSC-certified birch ply and metal plating. The bucket seat includes a cast iron base made from waste from the Vepa factory and a pressed and recycled PET felt back. The cushion is made using dust waste and wrapped in a cover fashioned from recycled plastic bottles.
All of the office furniture has been designed in such a way that, at the end of its useful life, it can be broken down for reuse or upcycled to make something new.
